It is widely held that the physical act of pointing, particularly with the index finger, is a uniquely human action and one of the foundation elements of human language. Computing systems provide the means by which expertise can be built into tools, such as, vehicles and unspecialized tools, such as robots. Efforts to build computing systems that support human modes of communication, such as, spoken dialog have not addressed this human communication modality since the domain of human computer interaction has not required this modality. As such, there is a need to provide a computing system that supports such human modes of communication.